5.  The applicant was born in 1954 and lives in Veliki Grđevac.
6.  Between 1979 and 15 January 1999 the applicant’s husband, E.B., worked for company V.S., also in Veliki Grđevac.
7.  On 15 March 1999 he lodged a civil action against company V.S. in the Daruvar Municipal Court (Općinski sud u Daruvaru), seeking payment of salary arrears and other benefits allegedly owed to him for the period May 1998 to January 1999.
8.  He died on 14 June 2000. The applicant and their two children were declared his successors.
9.  On 21 May 2002 the Daruvar Municipal Court, on the basis of an accounting expert report commissioned during the proceedings, found that the applicant’s husband had not received his full salary for the period May 1998 to January 1999. It therefore ordered company V.S. to pay the applicant’s husband’s family the sum of 24,540.81 Croatian kunas (HRK) on account of his salary arrears, together with any statutory default interest accruing from that date.
10.  On 12 September 2002 the Bjelovar County Court (Županijski sud u Bjelovaru), acting in its appellate capacity, dismissed an appeal by company V.S. and upheld the Daruvar Municipal Court’s judgment which thereby became final. As regards company V.S.’s arguments that the first-instance court erred in its findings as to the amount of salary arrears and other benefits owned to the applicant’s husband and that it had failed to take into account the fact that certain amount had been paid to the applicant’s husband’s creditors directly from his salary, the Bjelovar County Court noted:
“In the impugned judgment ... the first-instance court found that the defendant had had no relevant criteria for the reduction of salaries and that such reduction had been arbitrary and unlawful, and therefore it correctly found that the salary should be granted in the amount before the unlawful reduction.
...
In its appeal the defendant also submits unfounded arguments that the first-instance court made it to pay 50,00 Kunas of monthly fees which had been paid to the Croatian Veterinary Chamber. [However] this portion of the salary was taken into account by the accounting expert and the defendant was not obliged to pay that amount.”
11.  On 4 and 15 October 2002 the company paid the judgment debt.
12.  Approximately three years later, on 8 September 2005 the company brought a civil action for unjust enrichment against the applicant as her late husband’s successor in the Grubišno Polje Municipal Court (Općinski sud u Grubišnom Polju), seeking payment of HRK 23,093.17.
13.  The company argued that the sum claimed represented a portion of the applicant’s husband’s salary for the period May 1998 to January 1999, together with statutory default interest, that had been paid twice. It explained that it had been paying him a reduced salary in that period because before paying him his net salary it had deducted certain amounts and paid them directly to his creditors with a view to satisfying claims they had against him. However, this fact had not been taken into account in the previous civil proceedings instituted by the applicant’s husband even though it had been specified in the accounting expert report commissioned during the proceedings. Given that the Daruvar Municipal Court’s judgment of 21 May 2002 had required the company to pay a portion of the applicant’s husband’s salary it had already paid to his creditors, it had actually paid the same amount twice.
14.  During the proceedings the applicant argued that the sum claimed by company V.S. had been paid in accordance with the Daruvar Municipal Court’s final judgment of 21 May 2002, which had never been set aside. She also pointed out that the company had already raised the same arguments in its appeal against the judgment but they had been dismissed by the appellate court and had thus represented a res judicata.
15.  On 22 December 2005 the Grubišno Polje Municipal Court dismissed company V.S.’s action. It found that the amount claimed had formed part of the amount the company had paid in accordance with the Daruvar Municipal Court’s final and enforceable judgment of 21 May 2002, which had never been set aside. There were therefore two different legal bases for payment of the amount claimed, namely the debt claims of the applicant’s husband’s creditors during his employment and the Daruvar Municipal Court’s final and enforceable judgment of 21 May 2002.
16.  On 20 June 2006, upon an appeal by company V.S., the Bjelovar County Court quashed the first-instance judgment and ordered that the case be reheard on the grounds that the Grubišno Polje Municipal Court had misinterpreted the relevant domestic law concerning unjust enrichment.
17.  The proceedings resumed and on 15 February 2008 the Grubišno Polje Municipal Court found for company V.S., ordering the applicant to pay it HRK 22,143.17 together with any statutory default interest accruing from that date and the costs and expenses of the proceedings in the amount of HRK 19,301.86. The court held that an accounting expert report commissioned during the proceedings showed that the Daruvar Municipal Court had erroneously calculated the portion of the applicant’s husband’s salary company V.S. had been obliged to pay. It resulted in company V.S. paying the same debt twice; firstly to the applicant’s husband’s creditors during his employment and secondly in accordance with the Daruvar Municipal Court’s final judgment.
18.  On 27 March 2008 the applicant lodged an appeal with the Bjelovar County Court, reiterating that payment of the amount in question had been made in accordance with the Daruvar Municipal Court’s judgment of 21 May 2002 which had never been set aside, and that there had been no legal basis for ordering her to repay that amount.
19.  On 11 September 2008 the Bjelovar County Court dismissed the applicant’s appeal and upheld the first-instance judgment. The court endorsed the findings of the Grubišno Polje Municipal Court that the courts in the civil proceedings instituted by the applicant’s husband had failed to take into account the fact that he had not been paid his full salary for the period May 1998 to January 1999 because a portion of it had been paid directly to his creditors to satisfy their claims against him. The relevant part of the second-instance judgment reads as follows:
“ ... On account of this error, which the claimant unsuccessfully referred to in those proceedings, the claimant was ordered ... to pay E.B. a portion of [his] salary [that had] already been paid.
... the first-instance court therefore correctly found that the present case did indeed concern the double payment of the same debt, [the] double payment of a portion of E.B.’s salary ..., the first time voluntarily, and the second time on the basis of a final judgment. The first-instance court therefore correctly applied section 212 of the Obligations Act to the present case.
The arguments raised in the appeal that the present case concerns an already adjudicated [res judicata] issue ... and that the claimant’s claim is time-barred, are unfounded.
In order for an already adjudicated [res judicata] issue to be considered there has to be a subjective and objective identity between the disputes. [However] ... between the present case and the one examined before the Daruvar Municipal Court ... there is no objective similarity. This is because they neither concern the same claims nor are those claims based on the same facts; [the first case] concerned a claim for payment of a difference in salary and was based on allegations of unlawful reduction of salary by an employer, whereas in the present case the claim is based on factual allegations of double payment of the same debt.”
20.  On 30 October 2008 the applicant lodged a constitutional complaint with the Constitutional Court (Ustavni sud Republike Hrvatske) alleging violations of her constitutional rights to equality before the law, equality before the courts and fair hearing, and reiterating her previous arguments.
21.  On 1 April 2010 the Constitutional Court declared the applicant’s constitutional complaint inadmissible as manifestly ill-founded. The Constitutional Court noted:
“In the civil proceedings at issue the appellant (defendant in those proceedings) was ordered to pay the plaintiff, company V.S., the amount of 22,143.17 Kunas together with the statutory default interest. The remainder of the claim was dismissed.
The [lower] courts found that the plaintiff had paid the same debt twice (portion of the salary in the period May 1998 to January 1999) to the appellant’s predecessor (E.B., who had been employed with the plaintiff) and that therefore, under section 212 of the Obligations Act, it was entitled to request the repayment of that amount under the rules on enrichment without cause.
In her constitutional complaint the appellant challenges the application of the relevant law by the [lower] courts, reiterating the arguments which she raised during the civil proceedings and which were duly addressed by the competent courts.
 In her constitutional complaint, the appellant was unable to show that the competent courts had acted contrary to the constitutional provisions concerning human rights and fundamental freedoms or had arbitrarily interpreted the relevant statutory provisions. The Constitutional Court therefore finds that the present case does not raise an issue of the complainant’s constitutional rights. Thus, there is no constitutional law issue in the case for the Constitutional Court to decide on. ... “
22.  The decision of the Constitutional Court was served on the applicant’s representative on 11 May 2010.